Oxidative cyclization, ferricyanide coupling

Only para coupling was observed during the alkaline ferricyanide oxidation of 4-hydroxy-3-(3-hydroxybenzoyl)benzoic acid. 7-Hydroxy-9-oxoxanthene-2-carboxylic acid (515) was obtained in 21% overall yield from methyl 4-hydroxybenzoate (78JCS(P1)876). The synthesis utilizes a photochemical Fries rearrangement of methyl 4-(3-methoxybenzoyloxy)benzoate to prepare the benzophenone (514 Scheme 189). A similar route was used to prepare 2-hydroxy-2 -methoxybenzophenones, which undergo intramolecular cyclization with loss of methanol on treatment with base. 

The pioneer in phenolate radical coupling was Pummerer. In 1925 he showed1 that one electron oxidation of />-cresol using potassium ferricyanide afforded a nicely crystalline ketonic dimer of the radical in up to 25 % yield. Pummerer s ketone, as it became known, was considered to result from the coupling of two p-cresol radicals to give the dienone 1. This then underwent spontaneous cyclization to furnish 2. As proof of the structure... 

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